Gen Zers Are Saddled With Financial Uncertainties: Northwestern Mutual

It was the first time that Gen Zers were studied as part of Northwestern Mutual's annual Planning & Progress Study. Although millennial debt was included in the 2018 edition of the report, it wasn't cited for Gen Zers this time.

When asked to list the three things that would improve their lives the most, 50% of Gen Zers said having more money (50%), followed far behind by being more self-confident or self-reliant (27%) and doing work they enjoyed (24%).

"Given the age of Gen Zers and where they are professionally, it's not particularly surprising that more money would have the most immediate impact," according to Emily Holbrook, senior director of planning at Northwestern Mutual. But she found the other two choices "revealing," she said, adding: "The desire for more self-confidence and self-reliance illustrates the depth of their uncertainty even if their instincts and motivations appear to be in the right place. This is a generation that's looking for more than a paycheck — they're looking for meaning at work."

Indeed, when asked how they defined success, the top response from Gen Zers was "enjoying your career" (45%), the firm said, noting this is the only generation placing an enjoyable career first, ahead of attributes including "spending quality time with family," which ranked highest for millennials and matures, and "being healthy," which Gen Xers and boomers listed as their top attribute.

Despite uncertainties about their finances, Gen Zers were optimistic about their prospects, the study found. Almost eight in 10 (78%) indicated they believed that someday they would get where they wanted to be in life, which was more than 10 percentage points higher than the general public (67%) and also slightly outranked their millennial counterparts (75%), according to Northwestern Mutual. Meanwhile, 65% of Gen Zers indicated they were confident they would achieve their goals for the next 5-10 years, on par with millennials and surpassing the general population (59%).

Included in the survey were 2,003 American adults aged 18 or older in the general population and an oversample of 281 U.S. adults age 18 to 22 who participated in an online survey, Northwestern Mutual said. The results were weighted to Census targets for education, age/gender, race/ethnicity, region and household income, it noted.

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